Post-Election Riot Rages in Tehran

For the second day in row, Mousavi supporters marched in Tehran to protest Ahmadinejad's reelection. (Reuters)

"Ten people considered the masterminds of the rioting have been arrested and more will be rounded up soon," Ahmad Reza Radan, the city's deputy police chief, told the official IRNA news agency.

Tehran has witnessed fierce protests since Saturday as supporters of defeated presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi took to the streets to protest Ahmadinejad's re-election.

Final results of the poll showed incumbent Ahmadinejad winning almost 63 percent of the vote against 34 percent for Mousavi.

For the second consecutive day, Mousavi supporters gathered at the centre of the capital shouting "Death to the Dictator."

Baton-wielding riot police fired tear gas and clashed with around 200 stone-throwing protestors who set rubbish bins and police vehicles ablaze.

"Forces used tear gas in some areas to stop the unrest. The situation is under control," Radan said on state television.

Security forces detained more than 170 people, including a number of reformist leaders, and accused them of organizing the protests.

Radan said several of those detained were politicians who had judicial warrants issued against them.

"There were also some who had criminal records. They were organized to take part in the unrest."

Police beefed up their presence in main Tehran streets and squares, especially in the area housing Mousavi's office.

Mousavi urged his supporters on Sunday to continue with their protests.

"I again advise you to continue the civil and legal opposition throughout the country peacefully and in a non-confrontational manner," he said in a statement on his election campaign website Ghalam News.

Unprecedented 

The capital unrest is unprecedented and not seen at least since student riots a decade ago.

"No one is giving them commands, no one is ordering them, no one is leading them," Sadegh Zibakalam, head of the Iranian studies department at Tehran University, told Al Jazeera.net.

"Nevertheless, the government has started a crackdown on the leading reformist figures…The government reaction is too harsh, but it is understandable."

Trita Parsi, director of the Washington-based National Iranian American Council, said the anti-Ahmadinejad camp was taken by surprise and is scrambling for a plan.

"Increasingly, given their failure to get Khamenei to intervene, their only option seems to be to directly challenge -- or threaten to challenge -- the supreme leader."

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has endorsed the result and urged all Iranians to avoid "provocative behavior" and rally behind their elected president.

Ahmadinejad dismissed criticism of the election, saying the massive turnout was a blow to the "oppressive system ruling the world," a reference to Iran's arch-foe the US.

He said his margin of victory over Mousavi was so wide it could not be questioned and said the election was like a "football match" and the loser should just "let it go."

Mehran Kamrava, director of the centre for international and regional studies at Georgetown University's campus in Qatar, said the protests should not be taken as an indication of election fraud.

"The Western media has been talking to people in north Tehran, who tend to vote overwhelmingly against Ahmadinejad," he told Aljazeera.

"But let's not forget that many of the urban Iranians have priorities and proclivities that are not necessarily reflected in other areas of the main cities, and those people could easily have voted for Ahmadinejad," he explained.

"Iranian politics have proved themselves to be notoriously unpredictable and this could be one of those instances of unpredictability."